GARLAND — Like tens of thousands of daily commuters on Interstate 635, Texas' toll road debate is stuck in a traffic jam.

The Regional Transportation Council plans to expand 10.8 miles of I-635 from Central Expressway to Interstate 30, using managed — or toll — lanes to fund half of the $1.8 billion project.

Drivers would have the option to choose the managed lane and pay a toll to avoid congestion, as they can now on LBJ Freeway through North Dallas.

The tolling component, however, has to be approved by the legislature. Just like it did in 2013 and 2015, the legislature failed to provide such approval when it met earlier this year.

State transportation officials say they've been given no other way to pay for a mega project such as the one they call LBJ East. They move forward with plans to include tolled lanes, saying they have no other option.

'A billion dollars short'

Despite not knowing where the money will come from, representatives of the Texas Department of Transportation, the RTC and the North Texas Tollway Authority and local officials gave an update on the project Thursday at the South Garland Branch Library.

"There is $832 million in funding identified for this project," Kelly Selman, district engineer for the Texas Department of Transportationtold the crowd. "You're a billion dollars short."

If funding is approved, the section of LBJ Freeway between Central Expressway and Royal Lane/Miller Road would be built from 2019-mid 2022, the section south to near State Highway 78 (Garland Road) would be built form 2021-23, the section farthest south to Interstate 30 would be built from 2023 to mid-2026 and the Interste 30 interchange would be rebuilt from 2025-27.

(Texas Department of Transportation/Courtesy)

The plans call for five free lanes and two managed lanes in each direction, plus continuous frontage roads. LBJ Freeway in those areas of Garland, Mesquite and Dallas currently has four free lanes and one express lane in each direction. Some areas have frontage roads, some don't.

That's a change from the plan going into the legislative session that called for the managed lanes to extend over only about a third of the project, between Central and Miller Road.

Officials now say managed lanes over the entire stretch of LBJ East are necessary. Garland and Mesquite officials were adamant about including a $300 million reworked interchange at Interstate 30 in the plan. And the projected construction costs grow by$5 million monthlyjust on inflation.

Several of the 100 who attended a meeting about the LBJ East project brought signs to reiterate their dislike of using tolls to build roadways. The current proposal for LBJ East is to have two managed lanes in each direction, but also five lanes for free travel.

(Staff/Ray Leszcynski)

Michael Morris, transportation director for the North Central Texas Council of Governments stared into anti-toll signs from the crowd of about 100 Thursday and heard jeers at the prospect of a tolled component.

"Don't represent LBJ as a toll road," Morris said to those opposed to the tolls. "It has 10 free lanes and frontage roads."

There has been enough money for projects like the Southern Gateway at the Interstate 35-U.S. Highway 67 split and the downtown Dallas Horseshoe, but those have come in at half the estimated cost. LBJ East is the region's top priority, Morris said, and can no longer wait.

'We'll be shovel-ready'

TxDOT's most recent traffic counts show between 202,000 and 220,000 Selman said there are 430,000 transactions a week from the six express lane checkpoints.

Though the plan doesn't have the necessary state approval, it will move forward for Texas Transportation approval by year's end, then bids and environmental clearance. If the funding happens, construction could start in early 2019.

"We're going to go out, procure the entire project and get a price," Selman said. "We'll be shovel-ready."

LBJ East is the third portion of the I-635 project. It will connect completed phases in Mesquite and North Dallas. The managed tolled lanes would flow with those between Central Expressway and Interstate 35.

But Morris said the model would be different than LBJ through North Dallas in that the freeway would be publicly owned and the tolling component could scale back once bonds were repaid. He did not say, however, that tolls would ever go away completely.

"This project is nowhere close to the project in the west," he saidof the LBJ project in North Dallas. "The project to the west was built when the region had no money at all."